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    Ayn Rand Cult
    Ayn Rand Cult
    Ayn Rand Cult
    Ebook558 pages8 hours

    Ayn Rand Cult

    By Jeff Walker

    3.5/5

    ()

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    About this ebook

    Despised by the intellectual establishment, Ayn Rand continues to attract many thousands of devoted followers. Her "Objectivist" movement preaches an uncompromising hard line on politics, art, sex, and psychological health. Though much has been written about Rand, The Ayn Rand Cult is the first book to explain the true origin of her ideas and to show how they were shaped into a new, atheistic religion. Jeff Walker shatters many myths about Rand, exposing Objectivism as a classic cult, unusual because of its overt emphasis on self-interest, rationality, and atheism, but typical of cults in its guru-worship, thought control, trial and excommunication of deviants, and hostility to existing society.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherOpen Court
    Release dateMar 30, 2012
    ISBN9780812698190
    Ayn Rand Cult
    Author

    Jeff Walker

    Jeff Walker  - An avid creative writer of short story fiction titles in the genre of science fiction, speculative fiction and supernatural thrillers. Currently he resides in a small rural town with his wife and two young children in Ontario, Canada. He majored in art and creative writing in high school, and then,  attended college to pursue a career in Graphic Design.  After a few set backs and career changes, he is returning to his love of writing and art. He enjoys writing fan fiction, collecting movie memorabilia, and spending time with his family and friends. His first short story eBook published was - The Cure (November 3, 2011 on Kindle/March 3, 2013 on Kobo)  and then two more short stories followed - Incident On Bio-Moon Five (March 13, 2013 on Kindle/January 28, 2014 on Kobo) and The End Of Time (Aug. 31, 2012 on Kindle/Feb. 18 2013 on Kobo). These stories where then collected into his first full book, both in Ebook and Print - Distant Saga Trilogy: A Short Story Collection (August 2, 2015 on Kindle/Kobo - Republished Date, year on Kindle/Kobo - Revised Edition Date, Year on Kindle/Kobo/Blurb).

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    Reviews for Ayn Rand Cult

    3.5/5

    21 ratings4 reviews

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    • 3/5
      The author makes a convincing argument that the Randian movement is a cult. However, the author politicizes the book by making unsubstantiated political claims, which do not bolster his argument. For example, claiming that "natural rights theory" was discarded by libertarians by the nineties (based on some libertarian's opinion) is unsubstantiated hearsay, and detracts from the author's Randian cult argument. Natural rights theory was and still is very much alive and well within the American libertarian community, along with the NAP. The Rothbard references definitely convinced me that Rand's movement is a cult. Also, chapter 10 does a good job of providing evidence that Rand's "Objectivism" was hardly, if at all, original (if it wasn't already obvious).
    • 5/5
      I concur with the other two reviewers here. Anyone who thinks there is anything wonderful or special about Ayn Rand and her philosophy she labeled "objectivism" really needs to read this book. You will find out that she was a narcissist and her 'philosophy' will only ultimately appeal to someone who has similar if not worse psychological problems. Her black and white view of the world is as simplistic and ultimately mind-destroying as the most insane religious cult to which one could compare it. Reason as god and Ayn Rand as the definer of Reason? - Really? - that is so very wrong - and insanely absurd.

      1 person found this helpful

    • 4/5
      In the very beginning of his book, Jeff Walker aptly points out that people either heavily get into Ayn Rand in their teens -- or not at all. I first read FOUNTAINHEAD and ATLAS SHRUGGED at 31 and, while seriously impressed by her political and economic clairvoyance, was puzzled by her bizzarre view of humans and human nature and her desire, demonstrated in both novels, to steamroll over anybody who didn't fit her definition of a hero. Besides, I never understood how could a philosopher who preached individualism and self-reliance attract tens of thousands of adoring followers. Ayn Rand's ideal was not a follower, therefore, the followers could not, by definition, live up to her ideals or have her respect (which they didn't). Jeff Walker does a very thorough job of answering just that question. Yes, his theory may be considered debatable. It's an opinion, and he argues it convincingly and with style. He even preempts the insults, such as you may find below, by pointing out that when people identify too closely with their system of beliefs, they have no choice but defend them tooth and nail from any hint of cognitive dissonance. The politically correct, who wear their bleeding hearts on their sleeves, react just as hysterically to any fact they find uncomfortable. It's a fanatic's way. Walker's book is written with humor and decency, it's an easy and enjoyable read (and I don't read much nonfiction), and it has guts. The more you know about Ayn Rand from objective sources, the more sense Walker's book makes.

      2 people found this helpful

    • 4/5
      This fascinating book reinforces an observation I have made over the years: that the ideas of individuals once institutionalized, become perverted and reinvented by those who claim to be the authentic followers of the guru who invented them. Certainly this is true of most religious leaders from Christ to Joseph Smith. It is happening to Robert Greenleaf, and it certainly happened to Ayn Rand, although in the case of the latter she may have had a hand in encouraging the transformation and idolatry.

      Heresy and orthodoxy become important concepts once ideas have been codified and institutionalized: anyone with the temerity to suggest revisions or alternatives becomes a heretic and traitor. (Interestingly, the word traitor has religious roots. It comes from a Latin word meaning "handers-over," those Christians who obeyed the Diocletian order to hand over the Scriptures so they could be destroyed. Whether these traditores could receive communion again caused a major schism in the church. Over course one has to belong to an organization and to believe its basic tenets in order to be heretical or a traitor. Hence the difference between heretic and infidel.) Walker is no fan, but I think he makes the same error Philip Johnson did in his attack on intellectuals, condemning their philosophies because they were unable to personally live a blameless life. Walker denounces Rand because the did not often live the life she expounded in her books and he blames her for the iconographic adoration of her adolescent followers. Walker insists that only adolescents looking for a philosophical underpinning were susceptible to her beliefs, perhaps a questionable assumption, but one difficult to challenge given a paucity of data. More to the point he criticizes her for being essentially a derivative thinker (haven't most philosophers derived or based their thinking on the work of others?) and he says her books have little literary value. Ayn Rand, according to virtually everyone who knew her, was charismatic and unconflicted in her beliefs and that alone attracted many, often the young, to her. If she had a major flaw, it was her adoption of an orthodox position that considered views other than hers to be "unreasonable" and "unobjective," and to prevent the movement from developing its own orthodoxy.

      There is an apparently inherent contradiction between her celebration of individualism and self-reliance and the Objectivist movement itself, but that is in the nature of all movements and perhaps a great reason to avoid them, be they religious or philosophical. Ayn Rand's heroes were the antithesis of followers, but I suspect that humans are biologically programmed to want to adhere to groups and to define themselves by that group, and to identify too closely with the set of beliefs, the orthodoxy of the group, and to want to exclude and brand as heretics those who refuse to adhere to the group's principles. It's true of the religious right and the radical left. The irony is that most movements eventually become so enamored of the trappings of their orthodoxy that they lose sight of the original beliefs of the founder, in fact, they often become irrelevant. But that's why we have libraries, to help everyone challenge their assumptions.

      Clearly, the book is a vindictive, personal attack that will be ignored by Objectivists (who should read it, if only for the discussions of orthodoxy and heresy) and lauded by those who can't stand Rand. I found it a lively, if shrill, examination of the history of a movement founded by a passionate, if personally flawed, individual who, rightly or wrongly, has influenced a large number of people through a body of interesting novels; an examination of a movement to came to practice the opposite of the principles its leader espoused. **I know "their" is incorrect here, but it seems a nice gender-neutral compromise, surely much better than his/her or just "her" or "his", so I think it's time for the English orthodox police to admit this use of "their."

      minor corrections 1/15/10

      1 person found this helpful

    Book preview

    Ayn Rand Cult - Jeff Walker

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